Whether you are visiting my blog for the first time or you've come before, Welcome! Thanks for stopping by. This is the next installment of my crazy A to Z Blogging Challenge. My theme this year is "For Writers and Readers." And today's word is...

I is for Illustration

Illustration is a big part of any picture book – whether you are writing or reading it.

For Writers: Illustration Notes

Oh, those Art notes! The bane of my existence! Well, at least whenever I try to write a picture book.You see, I'm not an illustrator. But I know how important the illustrations are to creating a picture book. So, there's this blessed (or cursed) tool I have to use when submitting a manuscript: art notes.

I wrote a whole blog post about them which I will not repeat here. Instead I'd like to add that I still struggle finding a good balance of illustration notes. Sometimes I put in too many and other times I don't put in enough to make the story clear.Illustration notes become especially important when scripting a graphic novel. If you want to see how one author/illustrator creates graphic novels, read the back matter of Awkward bySvetlana Chmakova

For Readers Illustrations to Carry the Story

One of the obvious changes in the evolution of the picture book is the part that the illustrations play in it. In classic picture books, the illustrations usually duplicated the text, rarely adding to the story. Now, picture books are as much dependent on the illustrations for furthering plot as the text. I made this observation in a blog post I wrote for Read For Research Month. Here are few fun things you can do with illustrations:

With younger kids, try letting them help you tell the story by "reading the pictures"

​With older kids, try reading a story without showing the picture and see if they like it better.

​With adults (who love kidlit), make a timeline of picture covers to show how they have evolved

Links:

Wow, I did a lot of self-promo this time. Here are the links of my own writing I mentioned: